Observational foundations of modern cosmology 2/2

by Prof. Martin Bucher (Universidad Paris 7/CNRS, Paris, France)

Wednesday 19 Nov 2014, 11:00 → 12:00 America/Bogota

Auditorio 402 (Esc Física)

Not so long ago, cosmology had the reputation of being an area of physics where theorists were free to speculate with very few hard facts available to bridle their fervent imaginations. This situation has changed markedly over the past two decades with the discovery of the anisotropy of the 2.725 K cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation in 1992 and its characterization at increasingly higher precision by a host of experiments from space (WMAP and PLANCK), stratospheric balloons, and the ground as well as a host of other observations (galaxy surveys to extending to large redshift, SNIa observations). As a result of these observations, a standard model of the primordial universe is in the process of emerging. In these two one-hour lectures, I will review the physics of the temperature and polarization anisotropies of the CMB, following a somewhat historical approach and emphasizing the connection of these observations to theories of the primordial universe, in particular cosmic inflation. I will also discuss some of the practicalities of making and interpreting observations of the CMB, in particular how a likelihood is constructed and other statistical issues. I will discuss prospects for the future experiments in this field.